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American Street

Submitted by jenna on Sun, 06/11/2017 - 5:41pm

Fabiola Toussaint arrives at DTW from PAP having lost her mother to ICE along the way. She moves into a house on American Street (at the intersection of Joy Road) with her aunt Jo and cousins Chantal, Pri, and Donna. Matant Jo demands that Fab speak only English, but she keeps her Haitian self alive with a voudou altar and lwas.

It's teen stuff: dating, drugs, parents, friends, but with an urgency--and not the hyped up averting apocalpyse kind (not that I have any objection to that)--that lifts Fab's struggles above much YA fare. But toward the end things get a little more apocalyptic, reminding the reader than in Detroit, as in Port-au-Prince everyday life is fraught and getting the cutie isn't the gateway to happily ever after.

PPS Borrowed from Brooklyn Public Library, which loans ebooks for 21 days, compared to NYPL's 14.

author:

Zoboi, Ibi

Quotations:

So I carry the four hundred dollars in my bag, in a wallet, as if it's simply pocket change. It's the most money I've had to myself. It makes me walk taller and speak with more confidence. This unearned cash makes me feel a little more American. This is the beginning of the good life, I think.